1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a battery-operated light and, more particularly, to a portable, battery-operated light which operates automatically in drawers, glove compartments or similar enclosures when such enclosures are opened and closed.
2. Description of the Prior Art
Enclosures are generally of two types. One is the type like a drawer where the enclosure is formed by a cavity defined by the furniture structure into which the drawer is received at the mouth of the cavity. This type of enclosure is opened by pulling the drawer from the cavity to expose the inside of the drawer. When the drawer is closed, the drawer front provides a cover for the mouth of the cavity and, during opening and closing of this drawer enclosure, there is relative movement between the drawer and furniture structure such that the drawer moves along a path which is generally parallel to a reference plane, for example, the plane in which the top surface of the cavity lies. The other enclosure type is like a glove compartment where the enclosure is formed by a cavity in a wall or the like and a door is mounted at the mouth of the cavity by means of a hinge. To open this second type of enclosure, a latch holding the door over the mouth of the cavity is released and the door is rotated about its hinge, exposing the interior of the cavity. With this second type of enclosure during opening and closing of the enclosure, the hinged edge of the door remains more or less in a fixed position while the unhinged door edge directly opposite of this hinged edge moves along an arc of a circle. When the unhinged door edge approaches the closed position it is moving along a line that is generally at a right angle with respect to the cavity mouth or, more precisely, the plane in which the cavity mouth lies.
Generally, lights for enclosures are designed to turn on or off automatically upon opening or closing the enclosure, and include a switch actuator that usually engages the enclosure cover and moves inwardly with respect to the body of the enclosure when the cover is closed and outwardly with respect to the body of the enclosure when the cover is opened. The switch actuator ordinarily is a pin having a rounded tip which provides a cam surface that engages, for example, the glove compartment cover during closing so that the cover engages the cam surface and depresses the pin. In glove compartment type enclosures, the pin location normally is not critical since all that is required is to depress the pin sufficiently to break the light circuit.